Michael Wamara, Celia Aloma and Graham Abbey in Saturday, Sunday, Monday.David Hou/Supplied
- Title: Saturday, Sunday, Monday
- Written by: Eduardo di Filippo, translated by Donato Santeramo and Antoni Cimolino
- Directed by: Antoni Cimolino
- Actors: Graham Abbey, Rose Napoli, Rod Beattie, Seana McKenna, Gordon S. Miller, Celia Aloma, David Collins
- Company: Stratford Festival
- Venue: Avon Theatre
- City: Stratford, Ont.
- Year: Runs until Oct. 26
If you’ve ever felt restless and unsettled on a Sunday, you’re not alone. Most of us anticipate our weekends with great excitement. They’re our chance to relax, spend time with loved ones and even, perhaps, get our complicated lives together. Yet before we know it, Sunday roars in like a freight train with the next week’s baggage, our thoughts recalling trouble from the week before or borrowing it from the one to come.
Meditating on the passage of days and lives, Saturday, Sunday, Monday is a new adaptation and translation by Antoni Cimolino and Donato Santeramo of Eduardo de Filippo’s 1959 Sabato, Domenica e Lunedi, which became a 1978 TV movie starring Laurence Olivier and Joan Plowright. At Stratford, the three-act, three-hour production – Cimolino’s final directorial effort as artistic director – takes its luxuriant time at the Avon Theatre, simmering gently like its main character’s famous veal ragu and becoming richer as the night goes on.
Set in postwar Italy, Saturday, Sunday, Monday chronicles a three-day span in the life of a Neapolitan family. On Saturday, matriarch Rosa Priore (Rose Napoli) dolefully begins to cook the next day’s expansive meal as her marriage seems to marinate in indifference and ingratitude. (Rosa’s ragu, which steams from an onstage pot, smells tantalizing and is available for purchase at both intermissions. And yes, it’s pretty tasty.)
Graham Abbey, Josue Laboucane, Rose Napoli and Seana McKenna in Saturday, Sunday, Monday.David Hou/Supplied
Relations with her husband, preoccupied shopkeeper Peppino (Graham Abbey), are as strained as boiled pasta – to the point where Peppino suspects his wife of infidelity with accountant Luigi (Gordon S. Miller), the couple’s warm, thoughtful friend.
The Priores’ three children each add to the drama. Eldest Roberto (Jakob Ehman) and his wife, Maria Carolina (Celia Aloma), are inadvertently threatening Rosa’s hold on familial hospitality; middle child Rocco (Emilio Vieira) is creating tension with his father by trying to establish his own business; and youngest Giulianella (a feisty Katarina Fiallos) is seeking an independent career that chafes at her impending marriage.
The production looks as good as the ragu smells, full of colourful period suits and dresses by Francesca Callow. Douglas Paraschuk’s lovely set, starting in the apartment’s rustic kitchen and ending in its airy living room, adds depth with glass doors that lead to a terrace facing a series of balconies, suggesting bustling neighbourhood life where each flat hosts its own weekly drama. This underpins one of the play’s most appealing qualities: It creates a community that feels lived-in, with the playing space a thoroughfare for friends, relatives and professionals alike.
Despite its large cast and numerous plot lines, de Filippo’s play feels mellow rather than ambitious, eschewing constant comedy for a more observational air. What keeps it from being a prosaic family drama are its layered characters and the surprising way it seems to shift genres between each act. The generous script gives each role, no matter how small, at least one moment of distinction. Even a character such as Peppino’s dyspeptic nephew Attilio (Josue Laboucane) isn’t simply the butt of the joke; he finds fellowship with Peppino’s brother Raffaele, an enthusiastic (and in Geraint Wyn Davies’s hands, scene-stealing) amateur actor.
Miller’s Luigi is a ray of sunshine. A scene where he charms the play’s angriest character with pure guileless adoration is a lovely pushback against cynicism. And Rod Beattie, though somewhat subdued as the family’s doddering grandfather, makes the most of a running visual gag where he warps a series of hats beyond repair.
Liam Tobin, Gordon S. Miller and Graham Abbey in Saturday, Sunday, Monday.David Hou/Supplied
For a 1959 play set in a traditionalist community, the adaptation feels soothingly progressive. Rosa, Giulianella and Peppino’s sister Amelia each push back against perceived gender roles in a different way. As Aunt Amelia, Seana McKenna adds a bolt of electricity to the proceedings, whether she’s doting on her hapless adult child or speaking with brutal honesty about her unconventional love life.
Saturday, Sunday, Monday’s aforementioned genre shifts are both appealing and unsettling, mimicking the push-and-pull tension between the characters.
Saturday’s heap of introductions and intrigue seems to set up a bustling farce, though the act is paradoxically somewhat tedious compared with those that follow.
The next day, the farce unravels as the Sunday blues take root. Rosa sheds her ever-present apron-cum-armour for a turquoise sweater to explosive results, and it’s clear that the Priore parents have chosen to act out a melodrama, clashing with their children’s desire to see the events as a comedy. Abbey and Napoli showcase their combined firepower here, during a blazing confrontation featuring a heart-rending, impassioned speech from Rosa about the impact of emotional neglect.
As the week turns, Monday lands us in the new beginning of psychological realism, ending on something quieter and more delicate as Rosa and Peppino attempt a rare, real conversation.
The genre changes keep the play from feeling mechanical, but also give it a shambolic air, as set-ups often don’t pay off or are dropped entirely; they become moments that occur to build a sense of the show’s world without greater narrative purpose. A good cook, this structure intimates, must be patient, taking tiny bites of life to understand its full flavour profile. Whether you agree is simply a matter of taste.
And, like the dishes made with the utmost care on its characters’ plates, so the show feels simple, filling and hearty, designed for warmth and homey familiarity.
Come hungry, and chase away those Sunday blues.